Author Archives: Julie Rust

Have you ever gone to a conference out of town without anyone else from your school when you aren’t presenting and kinda don’t know anyone else there?   Well I just had that blessed experience (with about 10 days notice) when Kevin asked if anyone wanted to take his spot at SAIS in Charlotte, NC.  Continue reading “Okay, So Failure is Good for Kids. Now What?”

Authored by Hannah LeBlanc A big topic in the lower school is our new math curriculum. At a previous school, I taught kindergarten using Developing Roots, which is the Early Childhood curriculum associated with Think!Math, so I was pumped to adopt this new curriculum. One of the things that I really enjoyed about the Think!Continue reading “Math Resilience”

In this blog season of resilience-talk, it’s worth bringing up another flavor of resilience, one that may threaten to elude the hardest of workers, one that may be especially difficult for the most persistent people among us.   What if the failure, the hard knocks, come in the form of,  not failed achievements or missed deadlinesContinue reading “I’m Not for Everyone, and That’s Okay.”

Have you ever wished you could get in the minds of those inscrutable youth that fill your classroom? Have you ever thought to yourself, “Is this particular teaching move sticking? Is it working? If the children could design the day, what would they want me to do?” Have you ever wished, “Wow, if only kidsContinue reading “Freaky Friday: Student/Teacher Style”

Department leaders and grade level team leads/liaisons are in many ways the unsung heroes of the school.  They have the incredibly tricky dual audience of admin and faculty colleagues.  They have their feet on the ground, busy doing the work of teaching, but additional nagging responsibilities, like “oh yeah we have a meeting coming up!”Continue reading “Department Chair Share”

It’s been a minute since Inspire & Innovate, a Podcast for Educators, has jumped on the airwaves, but we promise that Season 8 won’t skip a beat.  In past seasons we’ve explored the invisible parts of teaching life, the ways that movies do and don’t capture the realities embedded in school environments, why “accountability” inContinue reading “The Podcast Returns with “Can We Talk About Building Resilience?””

Okay so let’s try a little thought experiment.  You need a sidekick.  Someone to help you navigate this very complex world.  Your very survival depends, in fact, upon making the right choice.  You have two options. Who do you pick? Did you pick A.? I think I might’ve picked A a few weeks ago, beforeContinue reading “The Surprising Antithesis of Resilience”

This post was contributed by David Orace Kelly. This Play, Eurydice. Last year, our audiences selected this play as their top choice for our Upper School production. Eurydice pops up from time to time in high school programs across the country and features high-level acting and technical opportunities for our students. From building an elevatorContinue reading “Eurydice: Upper School Production Notes”

It occurred to me far-too-late in the blog-blast game, about when my coffee took effect this morning. I’d been wracking my brain to wax eloquently with TEAM colleagues about building positive relationships for weeks and had neglected to ask the experts in our very own school. We’ve got counselors, chaplains, administrators galore that have thoughtContinue reading “Building Positive Relationships with Sarah Spann & Jessica Goldsbury”

Sometimes we as teachers-parents-grandparents get so keyed up about building the right conditions for our youths, we forget that relationships and accomplishments and life are all kind of mercurial entities.  They are less science and more art.  Things work when they work and they don’t work when they don’t. Sometimes we are so busy makingContinue reading “Losing is Good for Kids’ Resilience and Other Crappy Truths”

What metaphor best captures those first few weeks/months of the year? Is it a honeymoon or a roller coaster? A horror movie, a comedy, or a drama? I know, I know. It really just depends on the day, the hour, the minute. Here are a few snippets from my August teaching journal to prove justContinue reading “Excerpts from a Teaching Journal”

The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men           Gang aft agley, An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,           For promis’d joy! (Robert Burns’ “To a Mouse”) I said the word “frickin” in a meeting, as in, “I am so frickin’ sick of this.”  I’m not proud of it. But I’ve always believedContinue reading “You Can’t Please ‘Em All”

This post was contributed by Burton Williams-Inman. Ladies and gents! Thanks so much for taking some time to read my first ever blog blast contribution. I am thrilled to be writing and hope that there’s a word of wisdom or encouragement to be found here.  In my first year of teaching, I often relied uponContinue reading “Can We Talk About Building Positive Relationships?: Upper School Edition”

Ah, the office hour.  The very confusing not-mandatory-but-sort-of-mandatory thing that college professors often offer to show you how caring they are.  They post them on their syllabi, barely nodding to the significance.  But for some students, they make or break college success. This year I am asking students to meet one on one with meContinue reading “Office Hours with Dr. Rust”

If connecting with kids is a prerequisite to building positive relationships with students, I would like to cite a concern, a clear and present danger related to aging.  I don’t understand the children any longer. Whereas 20 years ago when I began teaching my main preoccupation was distinguishing myself from the youth, distancing myself soContinue reading “I Don’t Understand the Children Any Longer”

This post was contributed by Hannah LeBlanc. As a teacher, by the time May rolls around, I often find myself thinking about my class in a loving way, but also “it’s time for y’all to move on down the hall to the next grade.” And then, August rolls around and you find yourself face toContinue reading “Can We Talk About Building Relationships?: Lower School Edition”

I am convinced that building positive relationships with students WHILE teaching them a thing or two, especially in the first quarter of the year, is one part inherent-skill and three parts planning ahead.  That’s why I’m eager to share with you some words of wisdom shared by Val Prado (6th grade math) and Cyndi IronsContinue reading “Planning Your Way Into Learning with Val Prado & Cyndi Irons”

Tadaaaaaa! The 2023-2024 school year is over so that must mean we most certainly successfully conquered and now fully have unlocked the mysteries contained in the PD theme of the year: “Teaching These Days.” HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! (We barely scratched the surface.) Still, I am grateful for all of the questions we have unearthed together, and theContinue reading “Goodbye, Theme of the Year!”

All the words in this blog, minus the title and the first paragraph in italics, were authored by Buck Cooper. I had the distinct pleasure of being in the room when Buck was asked to share some thoughts with the board about shifting from faculty to head of middle school this past year and IContinue reading “Buck Cooper’s Year of Transition”

At the end of this school year, this blog child of our school is nearing five years old.  It could go to kindergarten next year. That’s 252-some published posts as of this blog blast.   It was born on August 19, 2019, and I don’t have favorites, but it is my favorite.  It is theContinue reading “Why Waste Time on this Blog?”